Four More Quilt Finishes for 2016

Hooray for Rain - Four More Quilt Finishes for  2016

Hello friends! I thought I'd wrap up 2016 with a big post on my quilt finishes from 2016 that I never got around to blogging about. First up, back in the Spring I participated in Kate Basti's rainbow mini quilt swap on Instagram. You can see all the quilts at #rainbowminiswapr2.

Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap

I started by taping four pieces of graph paper together and paper piecing stripes to the graph paper. 

Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap

After I removed the paper I sewed the stripey fabric into a tube, and then cut strips and split two of them at the red square, two at the orange square, and so on for every color variation, and sewed them back together separated by gray crosshatch strips.

Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap
Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap
Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap
Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap

I quilted in a crosshatch pattern to mimic Carolyn Friedlander's gray crosshatch fabric.

Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap

And here's the lovely quilt I received in return from @just_anne_marie! 

Hooray for Rain - Rainbow Mini Quilt Swap

Next, in October I finished a quilt for my dear friends Grayce's new baby E. Grayce and I both love the Cathedral Windows quilt pattern and rainbow quilts so I tried to give it a try. I followed the Missouri Quilt Company's Cathedral Windows method, which was the simplest method I could find. This quilt required a shocking amount of fabric: 61 rainbow five-inch charm squares, 144 white five-inch charm squares, and 288 gray five-inch charm squares. It made for a surprisingly heavy quilt!

Hooray for Rain - E's Cathedral Windows Quilt

I spent a lot of time noodling around with the color layout. Here's one of the layouts I toyed with. I ended up using most but not all of my colored charm square options. 

Hooray for Rain - E's Cathedral Windows Quilt

Here was my final layout, right before I pinned all of the colored squares down and started sewing the cathedral windows.

Hooray for Rain - E's Cathedral Windows Quilt
Hooray for Rain - E's Cathedral Windows Quilt

Next up, I finished a quilt for dear friend Heidi's new baby L. Heidi and her guy are California-cool, minimalist no-fuss types. I was inspired by this album cover and this quilt for my design. I was going for an abstract sunset over the Pacific mixed with a sailboat sail. 

Hooray for Rain - L's Minimalist Stripe Quilt
Hooray for Rain

First I cut strips and sewed them together, and then layered the striped fabric with a piece of white Kona cotton of the same dimensions. I cut them both diagonally, and sewed each striped piece to a white piece, and all of a sudden I had two quilt tops! 

Hooray for Rain - L's Minimalist Stripe Quilt
Hooray for Rain - L's Minimalist Stripe Quilt

I hand-quilted this one for baby L. I was incredibly happy with how it turned out. This quilt solidified my love for hand quilting - both the act and the look of the finished product. I think there's a good chance that this one will have a serious influence on quilts I design in the future. 

Hooray for Rain - L's Minimalist Stripe Quilt

Last but not least, I made a quilt for one of my oldest friends Katie's baby girl L. Baby L's nursery was going to be purple and green, which were my favorite colors as a little girl. Katie loves dahlias so I decided to make a giant dahlia quilt for baby L. 

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Hooray for Rain - Giant Dahlia Quilt

I used this tutorial, which was very helpful. Each of the color arcs is glued together before they are sewed together. 

Hooray for Rain - Giant Dahlia Quilt
Hooray for Rain - Giant Dahlia Quilt

I did my first free-motion quilting in the center, meant to look like petals at the center of a dahlia. 

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I wish you all peace and happiness in 2017! - j

Squash Blossom Wedding Quilt

Hooray for Rain - Squash Blossom Wedding Quilt

I'm so happy to be back to share this quilt. This is a special one for a great friend, Karen. Karen was my first friend in law school. We bonded over our shared loves of swimming and quilting, and then as luck would have it, we ended up in the same orientation group. That was it, friends for life. This ombre squash blossom quilt was my wedding gift to Karen and her lovely husband Paul. 

Hooray for Rain - Squash Blossom Wedding Quilt

I went with a mostly blue fabric stack because Karen's wedding color was blue. I also used Violet Craft's gold birds print because I knew Karen loved the birds as we used that print in a quilt we made together for another friend's wedding. 

Hooray for Rain - Squash Blossom Wedding Quilt

Here's a detail shot of the quilting. I did straight lines at random intervals. 

Hooray for Rain - Squash Blossom Wedding Quilt

And here's my slightly wonky patch on the back. I love using a smaller version of the gemology quilt block on wedding quilts. 

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The quilt finished at 90 by 72 inches. I hope it keeps Karen and Paul warm for many years to come.

This quilt is my entry in the large quilt category of the Blogger's Quilt Festival, one of my favorite places to find fresh inspiration. 

Hooray For Exciting New Beginnings!

Greetings, friends! And apologies for a very long absence. Back in February, I started a law firm with my friend and former colleague, Amanda Anderson. Amanda and I started at the same larger firm when we were both fresh out of law school, and it didn't take long for us to figure out that we enjoyed collaborating and had similar perspectives on the practice of law. Amanda is a terrific lawyer and I couldn't ask for a better business partner. 

One of the reasons I decided to go to law school was because I dreamed of practicing in the area of adoption law. I am so proud to tell you that our firm, Anderson Ballard LLC, represents prospective adoptive parents as well as birth parents involved in the adoption process. We also serve as general counsel to local community associations. Oh, and we blog on topics related to those areas of law right here. It feels so good to be building our dream business, and I am thankful and happy every day that we decided to take this leap. 

Of course, starting a business takes more work than you can ever anticipate! 2016 has kept me very busy. I've managed to sneak in some sewing here and there, but struggled during these last few months to find time to share those projects on Hooray for Rain. While there's never a shortage of things to do, I'm happy to say that life is beginning to normalize and I anticipate that I will be able to start posting my recent quilting projects here again.  Hooray! I'll see you back here soon.

Valentine Swap

Hello friends! Happy February!

I spent part of my weekend whipping up a batch of these amazing chocolate chip cookies, and making valentines for the Aunt Peaches annual Valentine Swap. Last year, I received incredible valentines from across the country and world!

I was so impressed by all the work of the participants last year that I had a hard time getting inspired for this year's swap. What better way to get excited about making valentines, then to pull out every pink, red, glittery, sparkly, heart-shaped item in your craft closet?

I decided on making a hot air balloon carrying a multitude of hearts in different shapes and patterns. I cut up bamboo skewers for the basket and got into a major fight with my glue gun. It won, but I'll get it next time.

I went for a rainy theme for my note insert since there's nothing better to represent Seattle!

My valentines are heading off to California, Florida, and Sweden. The message on the middle envelope says "Happy Valentine's Day" in Swedish. At least I hope it does...

Wishing you a very Happy Valentine's Day!!!

I made a pillow!

New Year. New Skill!

I've drooled over Jen's beautiful sewing projects over the last few years and considered myself completely unteachable in the sewing arena. Just trying to learn how to thread my sewing machine would bring me to tears. My friend, Hillary, and I have commiserated over our desire to be able to sew. For my Christmas gift, she signed us up for beginner sewing classes. We made a weekend of it, and did a few other fun Seattle activities.

We started with the Learn to Sew Class at It's Just Sewing in West Seattle. Our instructor Monica was so enthusiastic, patient, and encouraging that she made you think you could sew anything! She allowed us to bring our own machines and personalized all aspects of the class . We reviewed the anatomy of the sewing machine, threading the machine, and threading and loading the bobbin. This made sewing so much less intimidating. I have much respect for anyone who can figure this out without step by step instruction. It's the least intuitive thing I've ever done. And, this was the view from my sewing machine! It was hard not to love every minute of this class with a sunny day and a skyline like that!

Even though I've lived in Seattle my entire life, there are still so many touristy things I've never done. The night after our first sewing class we saw Joy at Big Picture Movie Theater, tucked under El Gaucho. The popcorn is delicious, with flavors like white cheddar and truffle, and signature drinks are delivered to you throughout the movie. The seats feel like you're being hugged by a cloud. I'll definitely be going back!

The next morning before our pillow making class, we did a Coffee Crawl through Seattle By Foot. We met at the Hammering Man on the most gorgeous January Sunday morning. Our stellar guide, Heather, led us through six delicious cafes, most of which I'd never heard of. We sampled french press at Cafe Fonte, chemex coffee at Cafe Ladro, fire roasted coffee and a creamy latte from Cafe D'arte, and the most amazing biscuits of my life from Cafe Lieto.  We ended the tour at Pike Place Market tasting flavorful pestos and truffle butters and balsamic vinegar from La Buona Tavola - Truffle Cafe, and a cupcake latte and chocolate covered espresso beans from Ghost Alley Espresso. The tour was incredibly informative and left me with an appreciation for all that goes into making a cup of coffee.

One quick thing about Ghost Alley Espresso. Last October, Hillary and I took another walking tour, the Market Ghost Tour, run by the owner of Ghost Alley Espresso. It covers so much rich Seattle history, all new to me, and was the perfect way to spend a dark and stormy almost Halloween night. Regular tour season runs from March - early November.

We ended our sewing weekend at Drygoods Design in Pioneer Square, and took the Handmade: Home Pillows class. Our instructor Keli was delightful and so incredibly creative. We made a Placketed Zipper Pillow and Envelope Pillow. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I was every capable of making a real life, useful object with a sewing machine. Thanks to Keli for her guidance and hand-holding!

Now the question remains, will I be able to recreate them!? Happy new year of crafting!